


Ride the Lightning

by Lys ap Adin (lysapadin)



Category: Tennis no Oujisama | Prince of Tennis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Angst, M/M, Threesome - M/M/M, crackfic, tennis subrosa
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-28
Updated: 2007-12-28
Packaged: 2017-10-02 05:11:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lysapadin/pseuds/Lys%20ap%20Adin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yuuta's brother has gone missing, and it's up to him to fill in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ride the Lightning

**Author's Note:**

> AU. Mostly gen. R for violence. 15777 words. This fic owes a serious debt to Austin Grossman's novel _Soon I Will Be Invincible_.
> 
> This was originally written for the last round of , but I wasn't entirely satisfied with the ending, so I rewrote it substantially. You can find the original version of the story [here](http://ghost-racket.livejournal.com/6337.html).

Aniki had been gone on some assignment or another for a couple of months (as best as Yuuta could tell, given the way his brother tended to come and go) when the two goons showed up on Yuuta's doorstep one Saturday at an unwholesomely early hour of the morning. Yuuta figured they had to be goons, because no one _normal_ was that tall or hulked that much. "Yeah, whaddya want?" he yawned, scratching his stomach.

The goon on the right flashed a badge at him, too quick for Yuuta's sleep-deprived eyes to really focus on it. "We'd like to speak with you, Fuji-san."

That woke Yuuta up more effectively than even coffee could. "Who are you? What's this about?" he asked, straightening up and thinking frantically, trying to catalog what he might have done within the last week or so to warrant a visit like this.

The goon on the left said, "We're not at liberty to say, sir. If you'll just come with us, they can explain it downtown."

"I didn't do anything, and I'm not talking to anyone without a lawyer," Yuuta said, promptly, the way Aniki had taught him to do, after the first time something like this had happened. "And I'm not going anywhere unless you have a warrant, and can I get a look at those badges again, please?"

The goons exchanged glances of the worrisome _we're **so** not legitimate_ sort, and that made a cold sweat break out on Yuuta's forehead. Fuck, he'd _told_ Akazawa-san that they ought to just pay off the yakuza guys. Fuck Akazawa-san for being a cheap bastard, fuck fuck fuck. "You're not in trouble, Fuji-san," Goon One said, after a moment. "We just need to talk with you for a bit."

If he slammed the door, could he make it to the fire escape before they managed to break it down? Probably not; he was still in his pajamas, and only had house slippers on. _Fuck._ "Look," Yuuta said, as placating as he could manage, "I'm really not sure what the problem is, but I'm sure we can work it out." Could he make it? No, but damned if he wasn't going to try, edging a foot back.

He was tensing to slam the door and lock it when Goon Two said, "It's about your brother."

Yuuta froze. "What about Aniki?" he asked--Aniki, who'd disappear for weeks without a trace on one of his jaunts to photograph exotic things, and heaven only knew where he went when he did, except that he always came home with pictures of strange places and people. Yuuta's gut clenched. Two official-sorta goons on his doorstep, here about Aniki, could only mean one thing. "Oh, fuck. He's dead, isn't he?"

The goons exchanged uneasy glances, and Yuuta swallowed. Oh, shit, Aniki _was_\--fuck. "I'll get dressed," he said, and turned away so they wouldn't see the way his eyes were wet.

He didn't recall much afterwards about the car ride; the Goon Twins took the front seat and he rode in the back, hunched over and miserable, mourning for the impractical photographer brother who'd finished raising him when there'd been no one else to do it. _Is it dangerous, when you go on these trips?_ he'd asked Aniki once, and Aniki had only smiled and changed the subject in reply.

Yuuta supposed he had his answer now.

Neither of the goons said anything to him or to each other, so he didn't rouse from his stunned grief until they turned in at a garage, flashing a badge at the attendant in the booth, and then winding their way down into a labyrinth of dim yellow lights and rows of empty parking spaces. "Where the hell are we?" Yuuta asked. This didn't look like the kind of parking lot that ought to be under the police station.

The goons exchanged glances again, and if he weren't so goddamn heartsick, he really would have been tempted to let himself get pissed off by that. "They'll explain upstairs," Goon One said, and that was apparently _that_.

They herded him into an elevator, more or less literally, since Goon One took his left and Goon Two took his right like they expected him to bolt off into the dimly-lit garage, and kept a wary eye on him while the elevator ascended to the tenth floor--the highest number on the buttons.

They emerged from the elevator into a hallway of what was probably a busy office during the week. It was silent and dimly lit this morning, with only the emergency lights to show them the way. The Goon Twins kept him moving, not giving him much time to examine their surroundings, until they found another set of elevators, more impressive than the ones that came up from the parking garage. The floors for this one went up all the way to thirty, which was the floor Goon Two pushed. As Yuuta studied his reflection in the mirrored walls (scruffy twenty-something, red-eyed and a little hungover, pretty much completely out of place), he started wondering just what kind of trouble Aniki had gotten himself into before he'd gotten himself eaten by crocodiles or whatever, because this didn't seem to be like any police station he'd ever been in.

The elevator chimed its way upwards, the ascent smooth and rapid, and let them out into an atrium that was as deserted as the office twenty floors below. Here, though, the lights were on, shining on the gently revolving sculpture of the globe in the center of the room. Yuuta had seen that sculpture before, in a documentary, and suddenly the question of where he was became clear, and a dozen others took its place.

He turned on Goon One. "What are we doing _here_?" he demanded, taking refuge in bravado, because panic (as Aniki had pointed out once) was never productive, and there was no way he was going to believe that Aniki had had _anything_ to do with the Japanese branch of the Bureau of Metahuman Interests.

"Just a little bit further, Fuji-san," Goon One told him, and steered him around the sculpture to the double doors on the other side of the atrium. There he laid his palm on a pad; after a second, a light flashed green and the doors slid open with a soft _whoosh_.

"You have got to be _kidding_ me," Yuuta muttered, when they motioned him inside, but he didn't have any conviction to put behind it, not when there was a stirring of something tiny and fragile in his chest that might have been hope. What if Aniki _wasn't_\--he stopped that train of thought, and went in.

The room was large and dominated by the long table ringed by high-backed executive chairs. There was a bank of screens against one wall, and light poured in from the wall of windows opposite, silhouetting the figure of the man who stood at them, looking out across the Tokyo skyline. He turned, cape swirling around him, as the door whooshed shut behind Yuuta, and Yuuta swallowed hard, because he was standing four and a half meters from one of the most venerated superheroes in Japan.

"Fuji-kun." The man they called Hashira, who had headed up the Seishun division of the League of Super-Powered Beings for years, and had defeated more monsters and supervillains than Yuuta could keep track of, inclined his head. "Thank you for coming."

Yuuta bowed, quick and jerky, the surrealism of being thanked by Hashira-san for his presence enough to push him into numbness. Numbness was good, though, because without it all of the overwhelming emotions of the morning would have tipped him over the edge into outright gibbering. "Sir," he croaked, mouth too dry to allow any more than that.

Hashira-san gestured at the table. "Please, have a seat. Would you like a drink?"

"No, I'm... I'm fine," Yuuta said, pulling out one of the chairs and sitting before his knees could give out on him. He'd seen this table before, in that documentary he'd watched until Aniki had called it trash and turned it off--this was where Seishun had their meetings about... well, whatever it was superheroes had meetings about.

Hashira-san poured him a cup of coffee anyway and took the seat across from him, gloved hands wrapped around the mug casually. Funny; Yuuta had never really pictured him as the coffee-drinking type. "I suppose you're wondering why you're here," he said, after a moment.

The coffee mug was normal and so was the coffee in it; Yuuta drew some equilibrium from it. "Just a little bit," he said. "They said it had to do with Aniki." He took a deep breath, and asked the hardest question first. "Is he--all right?" Hashira-san was silent for a beat, and another beat, and by the third beat, Yuuta knew. "He's not, is he?" he asked, voice cracking.

"...no," Hashira-san said. "I'm sorry."

_"You're not an orphan," Aniki had said. "You've still got me."_ Only now he didn't, not anymore. Yuuta squeezed his eyes shut and bit his lip till it stung and he tasted blood, trying to keep from embarrassing himself. It didn't work.

Hashira-san looked away, politely, until he got himself back under control, scrubbing his sleeve against his cheeks. "What happened? He get caught in some kind of stupid crossfire between you and your arch nemesis?" he asked. Boy, that would piss Aniki off if he knew, given how much he had despised the superheroes.

Hashira-san hesitated. "No," he said. "There are things about your brother that he didn't tell you, Fuji-kun."

"You're wrong," Yuuta told him, before he could think twice about contradicting Hashira-san. "Aniki didn't have any secrets from me."

Fortunately for him, the man didn't seem to mind. "I'm afraid you're mistaken," he said. "Your brother worked with Seishun."

"What, was he the official photographer or something?" Yuuta asked, and shook his head. "No way. He didn't even like you cape people. Said you were a waste of resources and energy."

The corner of Hashira-san's mouth kicked up, ever-so-slightly. "That," he said, "was because he found it convenient for you to think that."

Yuuta tried to quash the sudden spike of anger, white-hot against the dull fog of grief. "You think you knew my brother better than I did?" This wasn't the time or the place to get upset, he told himself. It _wasn't_. Anger throbbed in his temples anyway.

"I mean that your brother was a member of Seishun," Hashira-san told him. "You're sitting in his chair, in fact."

That distracted him from his anger. Yuuta couldn't help himself; he laughed at the thought of Aniki being a superhero--Aniki who'd sneered at the people he called costume-wearing lunatics at every opportunity, and who had never stopped being bitter that Yuuta towered over his slender frame. The idea was ludicrous, and he managed to gasp as much out as he teetered on the edge between mirth and hysteria.

Hashira-san let him laugh, sipping his coffee until Yuuta slouched lower in his chair, breathless. "I see he was good at keeping you from ever suspecting," he remarked, once Yuuta had caught his breath.

"You could say that, yeah," Yuuta told him, staring at him across the table. The man certainly _seemed_ convinced that Aniki had been--Tensai-san. He ignored that small, practical voice. "Look, I think I would have noticed my brother being a superhero, all right?" This was such a ridiculous conversation to be having when Aniki was--but it was diverting, and he clung to that. There was no way Aniki would have been a superhero, so maybe Hashira-san was just messing with him, and Aniki was off photographing stuff like normal, and would get a good laugh out of this when he came home. All he had to do was humor the crazy superhero for a little while, and then he could go home and forget this whole thing.

Hashira-san must have seen some of what he was thinking on his face. "Everyone says that," he said, tapping the table--no, tapping the buttons that were integrated with the surface of the table. "If you'll look at the footage, please."

Behind him, the screens flickered to life with footage of Seishun in action, clip after clip of newscast footage that showed Tensai-san fighting monsters both literal and metaphorical, giant lizards and supervillains, weaving and dodging and flicking them aside with a wave of his hands--what was Tensai-san's power, anyway? He tried to recall as he watched, but it seemed like Tensai-san was impossible to pin down. "This is all pretty interesting, but I don't really see what this has to do with anything--"

And then the footage changed from the professional-grade to something clumsier; the camera bobbled around as the fight raged on around it. It looked like the end of the fight; there was dust and rubble everywhere and the bad guy--whoever he was; Yuuta didn't recognize him--was looking pretty battered by the time Hashira-san-on-the-screen cold-cocked him. "That was careless," he told Tensai-san.

Tensai-san laughed, and a cold chill went down Yuuta's spine. "I'm out of condition," he said, and turned in the direction of the camera. "Did we have to record this? I'm going to burn the footage," he added, reaching to turn it off, and the image froze on the close-up of his face.

He was shaking his head even before the screen split and a photo of Aniki went up next to the still of Tensai-san. "It's not true," he whispered, even though side-by-side, the resemblance was unmistakable. "It's not--"

Except it really was, and even as Hashira-san was murmuring platitudes about how understanding he was of how difficult this must be, the anger was making his temples throb again. "Why didn't he tell me?" he demanded. "I'm his brother. I'm his only family. Why didn't he tell me?!"

Hashira-san rocked back a little. "I don't know," he said, after a moment. "All I know is that he felt--strongly--about keeping you out of danger."

"How would me knowing about--that--" Yuuta gestured at the twinned images on the screen "--have put me in danger?" He'd been upset ever since the Goon Twins had shown up at his door, and he was a hair's breadth from losing the tenuous hold he had on his temper. In the back of his head, he heard Aniki's ghost whispering to him, reminding him to keep control of himself, that the price of letting go was a migraine and that wasn't worth it, but Yuuta was beyond caring.

"He had his reasons," Hashira-san said.

"Yeah, so what were they?" Yuuta demanded. When Hashira-san hesitated, he shook his head, even though the back and forth motion made him queasy. "You don't actually know, do you? Don't bullshit me, Hashira-san, I'm not in the mood for it." He pressed his fingers to his temples. "You got anything else you wanna lay on me? Otherwise, I wanna go home." Home, where he could crawl into bed in a nice dark room, be as angry as he wanted to be, and let it take its toll.

Hashira-san was silent for several heartbeats, until Yuuta looked up again. "What?" He wasn't sure he liked the odd expression on Hashira-san's face.

Hashira-san was studying him, eyes intent behind that silly little mask. "Interesting."

Yuuta gritted his teeth. "What the hell's that supposed to mean?"

"Shuusuke took a leave of absence to care for you," Hashira-san said, slow and thoughtful. "And did everything he could to keep you away from all of this. I wonder if he did have a reason after all?"

Yuuta glared at him as best as he could from between slitted eyes. "Either get to the point or call your goon squad to send me home." Fuck, his head _hurt_\--

"Did you know it's possible to--" But he lost track of the rest of what Hashira-san was saying as the lights began to flash behind his eyelids, off-on-off-on in time to the beat of his pulse, until they went off and he slid down into unconsciousness after them.

* * *

He woke up in a dim room, hooked up to a machine that was monitoring his vitals, and groaned softly. Aniki was going to kill him for ending up in a hospital again--

No. Aniki wasn't going to do anything, was he? Aniki was dead, and had been a superhero, and _hadn't told him_ even though they weren't supposed to have any secrets from each other.

He was limp and drained from being angry, but that wasn't enough to stop the stir of another anger-headache. Yuuta pressed his palms against his forehead, trying to focus on something else, anything else.

The door opened and light spilled into the room. "Awake, I see," said a pleasant female voice.

Like that. Yuuta peered at her from under his hands. "You the doctor?" he hazarded, looking at her lab coat.

She smiled. "I'm a doctor, yes. Ryuuzaki Sumire, and you're Fuji Yuuta." Her smile dimmed. "I'm very sorry about your brother."

"Can we not talk about him?" Yuuta asked, cringing at the stab of heat behind his eyeballs, and tried to focus on her instead. Ryuuzaki Sumire--she was what, the woman who'd first founded Seishun, back before there was the governmental support for metahumans, right? Looked like this was his day for getting to meet living legends. Too bad he was mostly beyond caring.

She hesitated, and then nodded. "Of course." She picked up the chart hanging from the end of his bed. "Tell me, Fuji-kun, how long have you been getting these headaches?"

"Since I was twelve." Of course she'd want to take a case history. New doctors always did, for whatever good it did them.

Her eyebrows went up. "That's young."

"Was in a car accident. Had a head injury." And he'd gotten off light, with just the lingering migraines. He was still alive, after all. The rest of the car's occupants hadn't been nearly as lucky.

"Ah, I see. Precipitated by trauma, then." Ryuuzaki-sensei made some notes on the chart. "Do you find that they're triggered, or do they happen at random?"

"Triggered," Yuuta said. "When I get--upset. Pissed off. Aniki always tells--told--me to just keep a grip on my temper, and then I won't get them."

Ryuuzaki-sensei's pen stilled. "Did he," she said, slow and careful. "That's very interesting. I wonder what his logic on that might have been."

"I don't know," Yuuta said, digging his palms against his skull more firmly. "Can we not talk about him, please? It's making my head hurt."

Ryuuzaki-sensei set the chart down and leaned over him. "Are you getting another one?"

"Yeah, the start of one, yeah." He reached for calm, but it eluded him. "Fuck..."

Aniki would have told him off for swearing in front of a lady, but she didn't seem to even notice. "I wonder if there might be a way to stop them," she said.

"Sedation usually works," Yuuta grunted. "Or a good shot of whisky."

She huffed softly. "I meant for good."

"Not possible," Yuuta told her. "Aniki said--oh fuck." He squeezed his eyes shut, because even the dim light over his bed was too much for his eyes.

He heard her take a quick, sharp breath. "I could kill him myself," she said, softly, and then a cool hand was resting over his fingers. "Fuji-kun. Yuuta-kun. I think I can help you, but you're going to have to relax and let me. Can you do that for me? Will you?"

"Yeah, sure," he said, because what could it hurt? If she thought there was something she could do, even though the headaches were from the accident--

"Relax," she told him, and he had just long enough to feel the pressure of cool fingers picking at the knot of pain inside his skull and start to panic before everything came apart.

* * *

He was in the back seat of the car, leaning against the window, watching the lightning flash across the sky, followed by the steady rumble of the thunder. The lightning was close, bright enough to light the world in stark white for an instant, with every shadow so sharp that he could have cut his fingers on them. Kaasan and Tousan were talking in the front seat, a steady murmur against the _thwip-thwip_ of the windshield wipers.

Oh fuck. He didn't want to be here. He knew what was coming next.

"I don't know what it is about a little water on the road that makes people drive like idiots," Tousan said, as the car behind them hit the gas and tried to pass them. "I mean, honestly, we're going perfectly fast enough--"

"Maybe they're in a hurry," Kaasan said. "We really can't know--"

Another car started to pull around them; Tousan growled something that Yuuta knew he wasn't supposed to have heard, and carefully filed away; he'd ask Aniki what it meant later, because Aniki would tell him. "Now what's this guy's excuse--" he started, but he never finished it, because that was when the truck in the oncoming lane came around the curve in the road ahead of them.

Time slowed down; the whole car jerked as Tousan hit the brakes, and again when the wheels slid on the pavement, spinning them around. Yuuta tried to close his eyes, but he couldn't, and had them fixed on the opposite door when it struck the car that was trying to pass them and began to buckle. Someone was shrieking; it might have been him or Kaasan, or it might have been the scream of the brakes, for all he could tell.

Then the truck was on them with its horn blaring, and all he could do was stare at the glare of the headlights until the sickening crunch of impact.

Everything after that was a welter of pain and sound and terror and the sound of thunder, peal after peal of it while lightning lit the sky again and again, close enough that he could smell the ozone and feel the electricity making the hair rise on the back of his neck. It was too much; he'd done his best not to remember this moment for a reason, why was it coming up now? He tried to retreat; he'd done it before--

"No," someone whispered. "Not this time, Yuuta-kun. You're strong enough to face it."

He didn't feel strong at all, no matter what anyone said, but with that pressure at his back, inexorable for all its gentleness, he held on and endured the cold of the rain, and the pain in his arm--broken in three places, that was what they were going to tell him later, after he woke up at the hospital--fuck, this was confusing. Meanwhile the lightning kept leaping down from the clouds, too close, and when the police and ambulances showed up, they kept a distance. Why weren't they coming any closer?

"It's the lightning," that someone whispered. "They can't."

Well, what was he supposed to do about that? The lightning hadn't stopped until--until--

Until Aniki had come and calmed him down, and put him to sleep, and he'd forgotten all about it by the time he'd woken up again. Only this time, Aniki wouldn't--couldn't--come.

Yuuta nearly panicked again, and the lightning cracked loudly, even closer than before. "No," his guide said, "you can control yourself now. You know how."

Yuuta gritted his teeth; that was easier said than done. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath anyway, and another, trying to focus on the air moving in and out of his lungs to the exclusion of everything else, trying to find some semblance of calm. Breathe in, breathe out, slow and even, until the lightning slowed down, and then stopped, and the rapid beating of his heart evened out.

"There now," Ryuuzaki-sensei murmured. "I knew you could do it."

"I didn't want to remember that," Yuuta told her, and opened his eyes--and stared. The room was in ruins, monitors smoking and half a wall simply gone. "What the hell happened?"

"That's what I'd like to know," someone else said, standing in what had previously been the door. "Ryuuzaki-sensei, what on _earth_ is this?"

"It's what we like to call a breakthrough moment," she said, climbing to her feet and offering Yuuta a hand up. "If you'd stop by and talk to me sometime, perhaps you'd--"

"Stop!" Yuuta said, urgent, as she started to step away from him. "Don't move--" He reached out, like he could stop her from stepping down on a live wire just by willing it.

She stopped, but not before the electricity, which had been waiting, ready to reach out and bite her, came meekly to heel, coiling back on itself. "Ah," Ryuuzaki-sensei said. "Thank you."

"Huh. Who brought the latent in?" the other guy asked, as Yuuta stared at his fingers, not entirely sure he believed what he'd just done.

"Tezuka did," Ryuuzaki-sensei said. "This is Fuji Yuuta, Echizen."

Echizen-san's face went stiff. "I see." He turned on his heel and stalked away without another word.

"Took that well, didn't he?" Ryuuzaki-sensei said, but Yuuta got the feeling that she wasn't talking to him.

Just as well. "What--" He waved his hand and the coil of electricity he could feel, even if he couldn't quite _see_ it, moved with his gesture. "What's going on?" His voice rose on the last word, nearly cracking; but he'd more than earned the right to a bout of hysteria, and didn't particularly give a damn.

Ryuuzaki-sensei's smile was sympathetic. "Tell me, Yuuta-kun, have you ever heard of latent talents?"

"No," he said.

"It's when someone has powers that are dormant, or sealed away," Ryuuzaki-sensei said. Her voice went flat in a funny way when she said _sealed_, and Yuuta tucked that away to think about later, when he was less confused. "And they stay that way until something wakes them up." She surveyed the ruin of the room. "But perhaps we should discuss this somewhere else." Her mouth quirked. "Tezuka wanted to speak to you once you were up and about again, anyway."

* * *

Ryuuzaki-sensei took him back to the conference room he'd been in before, and she and Tezuka went through the explanations of what it meant to have superpowers. Mostly it boiled down to the fact that the superheroes themselves were mostly making it up as they went along. Even after the better part of a century, no one really understood why some people cropped out with strange powers, and Yuuta got the impression that the main difference between a hero and villain was that the heroes had a code of conduct and stuck to it. "So," Yuuta said, once he'd digested that. "What happened to Aniki?"

Ryuuzaki-sensei and Hashira-san (Tezuka-san? did Yuuta get to call him by his real name, now that he was part of the metahuman club?) were silent for long enough that Yuuta looked up from his hands. "He disappeared," Tezuka-san said, finally. "Just over a month ago."

"Doing civilian things," Ryuuzaki-sensei clarified. "We didn't know he was gone until he didn't show up for a meeting. We found his car, but it looked like it had been abandoned, not like he'd been in a fight." She glanced at Tezuka-san. "And there hasn't been a body."

"That doesn't mean anything." Tezuka-san's tone was clipped. "We all know what happened to Yamato."

Everyone but Yuuta, that was. "What does that mean?"

Ryuuzaki-sensei hesitated. "It means that sometimes there isn't a body."

Yuuta looked down again. "That means you think there ought to be one," he said, and felt the web of electricity running through the table and the walls and the ceiling pulse in response. He quashed the surge of emotion; now was not the time to get upset. Later, when he found who'd taken his brother, _that_ would be the time to get--upset. At length.

"Not all of us do," Ryuuzaki-sensei said. "It's possible that--"

"It's been a month," Tezuka-san said, perfectly even, and in that instant, Yuuta hated him for not caring about Aniki, who'd been his fucking _teammate_. "Shuusuke is more resourceful than this. If he'd been captured, he'd have escaped by now."

"And _I_ think you're being too pessimistic," Ryuuzaki-san said. "Everyone with the kind of resources it takes to tackle Tensai is already locked up, and has been for months."

"All that means is that there's someone out there that we don't know about," Tezuka-san said; it sounded like he'd made this argument before. "We need to spend our energy preparing for them."

"No one could be that powerful," Ryuuzaki-sensei said. "We'd have noticed--"

Tezuka-san cut his eyes over to Yuuta. "We didn't notice _him_ before today."

Ryuuzaki-sensei bit her lip, and didn't say anything.

"So. Aniki's dead." Yuuta was distantly proud of how level his voice was. "What I want to know now is how I find the bastard who killed him."

That got their attention away from their argument. "We've been wondering that ourselves," Ryuuzaki-sensei said. "And we've been working on it--"

Yeah, he was sure they had been, for all the good it was doing. "I want to help."

Ryuuzaki-sensei's smile was patient, and kind, and absolutely infuriating. "I'm sure you do, but--"

Tezuka-san interrupted her. "I think you have that right."

"What?" Ryuuzaki-sensei went from soothing to scandalized between one heartbeat and the next. "Tezuka, have you lost your mind?"

He carried on. "We do have a gap in the team, and you really can't stay neutral, not with the way you're oozing potential," he said. When Ryuuzaki-sensei squawked, he raised an eyebrow. "You think we should let him run around loose, and hope he gets snapped up by Abare instead of someone worse?"

"He's not even trained," Ryuuzaki-sensei pointed out.

"I learn fast," Yuuta volunteered.

"You'll have to," Tezuka-san said, "because you'll be just as dangerous to us as our opponents until you learn how to handle yourself."

Ryuuzaki-sensei gesticulated, face starting to go red. "Tezuka, you can't--I know you're upset, but this is--"

"I know what I'm doing," Tezuka-san said, interrupting again. "Wasn't that why you put me in charge?"

"I'm starting to rethink that decision," she said, and stood. "I do not approve of this."

"I'll take full responsibility for the decision," Tezuka-san said, looking up at her. "Like always."

That had all the weight of an insult, coming from Tezuka-san like that. Ryuuzaki-san's lips went white, and she walked out of the conference room without another word.

Tezuka-san let her go; once the door had swished shut behind her, he looked at Yuuta. "It's going to be dangerous, especially for someone who's not trained."

Yuuta met his eyes. "So what have I got left to lose?" He looked away again, out the window to the curve of the sky. "My brother's dead because someone decided to kill him. If you don't let me help, I'll go out and find whoever did it myself." And then he'd--

"Ryuuzaki doesn't understand that."

There was something in Tezuka-san's voice that made Yuuta look at him again--some undercurrent, a tension that he hadn't seen before. Perhaps Tezuka-san wasn't as dispassionate as he'd thought. That was something he could work with. "She doesn't have to," Yuuta said, after a moment of measuring Tezuka-san. "She just has to stay out of my way."

They shared a look, one of mutual understanding, and then the corner of Tezuka-san's mouth ticked up just a bit. "I can see to that."

Yuuta settled back in his seat. "I think we're going to get along just fine."

"Yes," Tezuka-san said, "I think we will."

* * *

He was beginning to have second thoughts by the time Tezuka-taichou ("I'm your captain now," he'd pointed out, while Yuuta filled out the paperwork that he suspected signed his life away to Seishun, and Yuuta had nodded meekly, embarrassed that he hadn't thought of it himself.) had finished introducing his prospective teammates. The group of them--men he knew by codenames, whose faces all looked naked without their masks on--stared at him, until finally Inui-san asked, "Who's this?"

"This is Yuuta-kun," Tezuka-taichou said. "He's going to be taking Fuji's place for the time being."

The seven of them reacted variously: some gaped and some frowned, and all of them looked surprised. Yuuta refused to fidget, and stared back, until Echizen-san pushed his chair back and planted his hands on the table. "This is _bullshit_," he told Tezuka-taichou, and walked out.

There was an uncomfortable pause, before Oishi-san ventured, "It does seem--premature. We didn't replace Fuji during those years when he was, ah, absent."

"We knew he was planning to come back," Inui-san pointed out. "This time it's different." He studied Yuuta. "Still... are you entirely sure that replacing him this soon is a good idea? Especially with someone who's just a rookie?"

"Yuuta-kun has enough raw talent to make up for his inexperience," Tezuka-taichou said. "I tested him myself."

And he had, at length. Yuuta was sure that he had bruises on top of bruises from their sparring session.

Kaidoh-san sat back in his chair. "Good enough for me," he said, folding his arms.

"It _would_ be," Momoshiro-san muttered.

"You saying his word isn't good enough for you?" Kaidoh-san growled.

Momoshiro-san scowled. "No, just you--"

"Momo! Kaidoh!" Oishi barked. "Cool it." He took a breath. "Tezuka, I don't think this is a good idea."

"Noted," Tezuka-taichou said.

"And overruled, I take it." Kikumaru-san cocked his head. "Or am I wrong?"

"Since when is this a dictatorship?" Momoshiro-san asked. "No offense, taichou, but you've been weird ever since Fuji bought it."

"Show some respect!" Kaidoh-san elbowed him.

Momoshiro-san elbowed him back. "I'm trying, but saying that some untried kid off the street can replace Fuji is just _stupid_."

"So try me," Yuuta said, tired of being bickered over like he wasn't even there. "Decide whether I'm good enough to replace Aniki after you've seen what I can do."

"We all saw the infirmary," Momoshiro-san said, at the same time Kawamura-san said, "Wait, 'Aniki'?"

"Ah," Inui-san said. "It seems that superpowers must run in the family." He pushed his glasses up, studying Yuuta. "Interesting."

Kikumaru-san tapped his chin. "That puts a different spin on things, doesn't it?"

"It doesn't matter who his brother is. He's still a rookie," Momoshiro-san said.

"Yes, but..." Kikumaru pursed his lips, and then clapped his hands. "All right. Practice room." He bounced to his feet, grinning. "Let's see if you're as much fun to play with as Fuji was."

"Oh, like this is even going to be a contest," Momoshiro-san muttered, just barely audible over the creak of chairs and other murmurs as everyone stood.

Yuuta let them sweep him along, through the maze of corridors on what Tezuka-taichou had explained were the private floors of Seishun's headquarters, trying to summon up everything he knew about Kikumaru-san. It wasn't much: he went by Kuroneko in the field, and moved and fought like a ninja. He was fast, that much Yuuta knew for a fact, and when he fought with Oishi-san, nearly always deadly.

Judging from the frown on Oishi-san's face, Kikumaru-san was fighting alone today. Yuuta told himself that that was a comforting thought. He'd probably be able to draw things out for a little bit. Thirty seconds, maybe, before Kikumaru-san put him down.

"Bet you a month's worth of KP duty that Eiji knocks the kid out with one hit," Momoshiro-san said to Kaidoh-san.

Kaidoh-san glanced at Yuuta, eyes heavy-lidded and thoughtful. "You're on."

Great, no pressure or anything. Yuuta swallowed hard and surreptitiously wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans.

Echizen-san was already in the practice room, pounding on a punching bag, when they came in. "What's this?" he asked, eyes sweeping over Yuuta like he didn't even exist.

"A demonstration's worth a thousand words, Ochibi," Kikumaru-san said, kicking off his shoes and stepping onto the mat, bouncing on the balls of his feet. "You mind?"

Echizen-san snorted. "Not at all. I could use a good laugh." He stepped off the mat and leaned against the wall, arms crossed.

Maybe Echizen-san and Aniki had been mortal enemies, and that was why Echizen-san had adopted this hate-on-sight approach. That made as much sense as anything.

And this really wasn't the time to worry about it. Yuuta shook out his arms, kicked off his shoes, and stepped onto the mat, watching Kikumaru-san warily.

Kikumaru-san was watching him just as carefully, for all of his exuberance, and they circled each other slowly. Yuuta waited for some sign that Kikumaru-san was about to move, some tension in his muscles or maybe a shift in his expression.

Kikumaru-san didn't give him any such warning; one moment he was prowling across from Yuuta and the next he was lunging forward, hand balled in a fist. Yuuta wasn't sure how he managed to dodge it, but there was some shift in the air that was just enough to be perceptible, and he danced out of Kikumaru-san's reach.

"That was one month of KP duty, you said?" Kaidoh-san said, as they went back to circling each other. "Want to make it two?"

"Shut up, Mamushi."

All of the staring made his skin prickle--no, focus on Kikumaru-san, pay attention to what he's doing--there! Yuuta danced away from a kick, getting out of range a bare instant ahead of the foot that sliced through the space where his head had been.

Kikumaru-san laughed. "Well, he knows how to duck." His eyes were gleaming. "Don't you know how to attack?"

"Maybe," Yuuta said, and swung at him. It was a futile blow and he knew it, and what's more, Kikumaru-san knew it, and was out of range before Yuuta could even think of connecting. "Fuck."

Kikumaru-san clucked. "Tsk, language, Yuuta-kun. Did Fuji let you get away with talking like that?"

Kikumaru-san meant for that to make him angry, and it worked; Yuuta's skin prickled with the sudden surge of anger, and the lights overhead dimmed just a bit. "Aniki didn't much give a damn how I said things," he said, softly. "He was more interested in me knowing what I was talking about."

Kikumaru-san looked briefly uncertain--had he expected angry to mean out-of-control? He was a good decade too late for that. "Is that so?" he asked, and punctuated the question with another kick.

Yuuta felt the air crackle just ahead of Kikumaru-san's foot, and got the inkling of an idea as he dodged. "Yeah, pretty much," he said, trying for another ineffectual punch.

"Well, at least he _tried_," Kikumaru-san sighed, and lashed out with a palm that would have caught Yuuta in the solar plexus if it had connected.

Yuuta slid out of the way and seized Kikumaru-san's wrist, and sent a surge of the electricity he'd gathered up his arm--a little more than he'd strictly meant to use, because Kikumaru-san jerked back and went down hard, twitching. Yuuta followed him down, and had an elbow at his throat before Kikumaru-san could do more than groan. "I'd say Aniki did a damn fine job, thanks."

"Could have done a lot worse," Kikumaru-san said, teeth chattering, and tapped out. "Kind of on the raw side, I guess," he announced to the room at large, once Yuuta'd let him up. He looked at Yuuta. "But there's some potential there."

Echizen-san snorted. "Please. You didn't even push him very hard." He pushed away from the wall and stepped onto the mat. "I want to see a real match." He lifted a hand, bouncing a bit of fire in his palm. "You game?" he asked Yuuta.

Yuuta swallowed hard--Kikumaru-san had been luck, more than anything else. Echizen-san--Echizen-san was the kind of person who negated luck. "Sure," he said.

He almost didn't brace himself in time; Echizen-san attacked before Kikumaru-san was even off the mat, ignoring his yelp and lashing out with a thin line of flame that Yuuta had to track with his eyes alone. "No electrical field in a flame, is there?" Echizen-san asked, as he scrambled out of the way.

"Haven't found one yet," Yuuta said, and decided to save his breath, because Echizen-san fought aggressively, never letting up on his attack and not pulling any punches the way Kikumaru-san had. It was very nearly all he could do to stay out of the way of that wicked lick of flame, and he was conscious of the stink of burned hair from the times when he didn't quite make it, and the fire singed the hair off his arm.

"I'm not seeing much potential here, Kikumaru-senpai," Echizen-san murmured, as Yuuta got another singe across his arm. "Are you sure you're not just slowing down?"

"You're mean, Ochibi," Kikumaru-san said.

Echizen-san's grin was sudden and fierce. "Yeah, I am."

Great. Just freaking _great_. Yuuta took a breath; if he was going to go down anyway, it might as well be with some style. "I'll have to remember that," he grunted, and launched his counterattack with a flurry of kicks and punches. All he needed was to land one, just one--

\--but Echizen-san had been watching, pretty closely, and wouldn't let him. "I don't think so," he said, and blurred into motion.

Something slammed into Yuuta's gut and swept behind his feet, and the room spun until he landed on the mat, breath whooshing out of his lungs, and there was a hand on his throat, squeezing just enough to make him freeze. "He knows how to dodge," Echizen-san said, eyes glittering a feline sort of gold as he looked down at Yuuta. "And that's about it."

Yuuta tapped the mat twice; Echizen-san held him a moment longer and then let him up, and turned away, stalking past the rest of his silent team. "This is still bullshit," he said, as he went past Tezuka-taichou.

"I heard you the first time," Tezuka-taichou said, just as chilly.

Echizen-san paused like he wanted to say something else, and then shook his head and stalked out.

"Hey," Kikumaru-san said, artificially jolly. "I think he's cheering up."

Yuuta bit his tongue against saying something about Echizen-san that he'd regret.

* * *

He'd figured his showing against Kikumaru-san and Echizen-san would be enough to prove that he wasn't cut out for Seishun after all, but apparently they'd seen something they approved of in those matches. No one seemed inclined to argue his place on the team afterwards--at least in places where Yuuta could hear them, and he was allowed to stay on and try to fit himself into the superhero lifestyle somehow or another.

He supposed that was about the best he could hope for, given the circumstances, and did his best. There wasn't as much fuss as he'd expected; when he called Akazawa to resign his crappy job at the convenience store, the man didn't even bother protesting. There were only a few boxes of things from his apartment that were worth carting downtown to the rooms allotted to him, and that was that for his old life.

Most of his new teammates ignored him as he went about his business, spending hours each day in the training rooms, working with his newfound powers, refining his control and exploring his limits. Inui-san took the most active interest in him, observing his training and offering suggestions from time to time, but Yuuta suspected that it was more from scientific curiosity than any kind of personal interest.

That was fine. Inui-san knew his stuff, the training regimens he suggested helped, and all Yuuta really needed to do was stick around until they (or more precisely, the floors of support staff whose jobs were to track the criminal subset of the metahuman world) figured out what had happened to Aniki. And Yuuta had long since learned how to be patient.

But there were things about the superhero life he didn't expect at all, like the uniform. Oishi-san was the one who talked to him about that, catching him one day after he'd come away from practicing. "Your uniform came in," he announced. "Want to try it on?"

"My... uniform?" Yuuta echoed.

"Your uniform," Oishi said, nodding. "Come on, we need to see if it's going to need alterations." And he dragged Yuuta downstairs to one of the many support departments that Yuuta hadn't ever visited, before Yuuta could even protest.

It was worse than he'd feared. Tezuka-taichou--well, he had the presence to carry off a cape, no question. And most of the rest of the team had been athletic for years, and had the legs to wear tights. The spandex unitards... well, at least there was solidarity to them.

Unfortunately, all three elements put together on him just looked ridiculous.

Yuuta stared at his reflection and shook his head. "No."

"It doesn't fit right?" the wardrobe lady asked, already swooping in with pins and a tape measure.

Yuuta shook his head again. "It fits fine. I'm just not going to wear it." He undid the cape and tossed it aside.

"You have to have a uniform," Oishi-san said, aghast.

"Not this one, I don't," Yuuta told him, trying to skin out of the unitard; it was fighting him, and the wardrobe lady--what was her name? Osakada-san?--wasn't helping as she tried to check the fit of it across his shoulders.

"Yuuta-kun, it's _required_." Oishi-san, so he'd discovered, was a bit of a stickler for following the rules.

Yuuta managed to get the unitard off, and planted his hands on his hips. "Is the cape _required_?" he demanded.

"Well... no. Not exactly," Oishi-san said.

"It just looks nice!" Osakada-san chimed in. "All swishy. Very dramatic."

Yuuta shuddered. "Okay, well, are the _tights_ required?"

"Not as such," Oishi-san said, after a moment. "They're just... traditional."

"Uh-huh." Yuuta pointed at the unitard. "So is the spandex required, or is it just traditional, too?"

Oishi-san hemmed and hawed for a moment, and muttered something that sounded very like "traditional" to Yuuta's ears.

"I thought so." Yuuta folded his arms. "Just what, exactly, _is_ required?"

"A mask and the team insignia," Osakada-san volunteered, while Oishi-san looked uncomfortable.

"I rest my case," Yuuta said, grim. "I'm not wearing that crap. I'll come up with my own damn uniform."

"You don't really have the time," Oishi-san said. "Or rather, Tomoka-chan doesn't. The press conference is tomorrow."

"What press conference?" Yuuta demanded. "This is the first I've heard of any damn press conference!"

"The one where they introduce you to the world, silly." Osakada-san patted his shoulder. "It's been a long time since we've had one... not since... well. It's been a long time."

"Oh holy fuck," Yuuta said.

"I'll just leave you to your fitting, then," Oishi-san said, and slipped out.

"I really don't have time to do a complete costume, Yuuta-kun," Osakada-san said, a bit apologetic. "If I'd known you didn't like the traditional stuff--"

"I didn't even know I was getting a costume," he said.

"You didn't?" She blinked. "But I sent a message to you about it a week or two ago. Echizen-kun promised he'd get it to you. When I didn't hear from you, I just assumed you wanted something in the classic mode."

"Ah... huh. I guess the message must have gotten lost," Yuuta said, carefully. Holy _fuck_, what had he done to piss Echizen off this much? "I'm just kind of... careless, I guess."

"Well, you can wear this tomorrow, and I'll do something better up for you later--" she started.

"What if all you had to do was make some alterations?" he asked.

 

Osakada-san opened her mouth, and then closed it, looking thoughtful. "Just what are you thinking?" she asked.

Yuuta grinned a little and told her, and was beyond pleased when she started nodding.

And Echizen could just sit on _that_ and rotate, he thought.

* * *

Oishi-san looked scandalized and Kikumaru-san couldn't stop laughing, and Ryuuzaki-sensei just looked like she had a headache.

"Nice pants, kid," Momo-san told him. "This isn't an idol show, you know."

"You're just jealous that I make these things look good," Yuuta told him, and hooked a thumb in the belt loop of his pants (black, and leather, and tight enough that Osakada-call-me-Tomoka-chan had asked him, worriedly, whether he was concerned about having children).

"You look like a hooker," Echizen-san said, not even looking up from his book. "A _cheap_ hooker."

"A hooker who isn't wearing tights," Yuuta retorted. "_Or_ spandex."

Echizen opened his mouth, but Tezuka-taichou broke in. "It's time," he said.

Yuuta dutifully fell in at the end of the line as they filed into the auditorium that was stuffed full of flashing lights and people--holy fuck, who knew there were so many people who cared about what the caped weirdoes got up to?

He tried not to look amazed, or intimidated, and frowned into the middle distance while Ryuuzaki-san made a short speech about how Seishun welcomed its newest member with much pleasure, blah blah blah, sure to be a fine addition to the team etc. no further ado, presenting Raitei.

Wait, was she talking about _him_? Yuuta did his best not to look startled; Echizen must not have had a hand in picking his codename out, because it was actually kind of _cool_.

He made his way to the podium to the accompaniment of camera flashes; afterwards, he couldn't even recall what he said, except that it had to do with how honored he was to be a part of Seishun and how he looked forward to learning from his esteemed colleagues. Or something like that. Fortunately, he didn't have to talk long, and got to surrender the stage to Tezuka-taichou for the questions afterward.

And that was when things got hairy. One reporter wanted to know where Aniki was. Another wanted to know whether his absence signaled another in-group schism. Still another wanted to know how Seishun justified the expense of another member when there wasn't much need for their services. Tezuka-taichou answered them all diplomatically enough, mentioning Tensai's need for another sabbatical--no, he couldn't say when Tensai would return; Tensai was rather temperamental, and no, of course Raitei wasn't a replacement, he was an _addition_ to the team, and as for their expenses, he'd like to think that they'd justified their existence several times over by now.

Yuuta tried to look attentive, or at least not too obviously bored, as the questions and answers dragged out forever, until Ryuuzaki-san stepped in and called an end to the conference, and they could all file back out again.

"And now you know why we let taichou answer the questions," Kikumaru-san told him, while Momo-san groaned and rubbed his neck. "Pretty boring, huh?"

"Not as bad as watching paint dry."

Kikumaru-san laughed. "Yeah, I guess not."

* * *

He'd made it to his room when he realized he had left his gloves in the conference room. He nearly left them for the night, but they were the only pair he had, jerry-rigged by Tomoka-chan, so Yuuta turned back around to get them.

The conference room wasn't empty; raised voices spilled out into the hall. "--you _liar_."

That was Echizen, and Yuuta stopped short, held up by his curiosity.

"I didn't say anything today that wasn't true." Tezuka-taichou, sounding testy.

"You're still lying." Echizen sounded bitter. "I'm the only one who thinks he's still alive."

"Ryouma, you know I have to be practical--"

"Kunimitsu, it's _Shuusuke_! How can you be practical when it's _Shuusuke_?"

"I don't have a choice, you know that--"

"There's always a choice--"

"--damn it, Ryouma, do you think I _want_ to believe he's dead?"

"You sure as hell seem pretty eager to _replace_ him."

"Yuuta has his own reasons for being here. They don't have anything to do with being a replacement."

"I wonder." Echizen sounded cynical.

"I'm not going to have this argument again. Good night, Ryouma."

Yuuta had just enough time to hide in one of the smaller conference rooms before Tezuka-taichou stormed out, jaw set in irritation.

...wow. He should have just left the gloves, definitely. But--Echizen didn't think Aniki was--

This promised to be all kinds of awkward.

He squared his shoulders anyway, and let himself into the main conference room. Echizen was sitting in his chair, hunched over and looking (for once) as small as he actually was. "I thought you said we weren't having this argument--" he started, and then looked up. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Do you really think Aniki is alive?" Yuuta asked.

Echizen's mouth twisted. "So what if I do?"

So _what_? Yuuta clenched his fists. "So you think you're the only one who loves him?" he asked from between clenched teeth. _That_ startled Echizen enough that his face unbent a little. "Oh yeah. I noticed, Echizen." Pretty hard not to, when Echizen had been yelling at Tezuka-taichou with that raw edge in his voice. "And since you didn't notice, Aniki was--is--the only family I _have_. I'm only here because I want to find whoever it was that killed him, and make him suffer for it, so if Aniki is--if he's not--" Echizen was staring at him, and he'd gone unreadable again. "Oh, fuck it. Never mind." His gloves were in the chair where he'd left them, and he scooped them up.

"Everyone else gave up." Echizen's voice was softer than normal. "When a couple of weeks had gone by and we hadn't heard from him. Everyone figured his luck had run out."

Yuuta frowned and looked at him. "That's not what I heard from Ryuuzaki-sensei." She had argued with Tezuka-taichou, right?

"She doesn't believe it. If she really believed there was still hope, she wouldn't keep trying to get me into counseling." Echizen's smile was mocking. "For my unresolved grieving issues, you see."

"I..." Yuuta sat. "I do see." He hesitated. "Tezuka-taichou--"

"Kunimitsu had to choose between... between us, and between being taichou." Echizen's mouth twisted. "He chose being taichou."

Yuuta chalked another one up to the list of things Aniki hadn't thought was worth telling him. "Got it." He twisted the gloves in his hands. "So what makes you think he's still--"

"I would know."

Yuuta studied him--hell, maybe Echizen _would_ know. There were superpowers, and there were _superpowers_, and Echizen definitely fell into the camp of people with more useful knacks than any one person could possibly make use of. "All right. So how do we find him and get him out of trouble?"

Echizen stared at him. "How do we--" He laughed, short and harsh. "That's it?"

Didn't Echizen _get_ it? "I'd rather believe you when you say Aniki is alive than everyone else who says he's dead. So how do we find him?"

"I've got a couple of guys downstairs who are working on this on the side," Echizen said. He sighed. "There's just not enough to work with. Nothing we can make a pattern out of."

"I can look too," Yuuta said. "Or maybe I can be a fresh pair of eyes? Ones that might catch things other people have overlooked?"

"I don't think there's much--" Echizen stopped. "But it couldn't hurt."

"That's what I figured." Yuuta stood. "I'll start in the morning."

He'd almost made it to the door when Echizen spoke up again. "You don't mind?"

He turned back. "Mind what?"

Echizen made a gesture. "That the three of us are--" He stopped, looking as embarrassed as Yuuta'd ever seen him.

"What's there to mind?" Aside from the fact that Aniki hadn't bothered to tell him about it himself, that is.

That self-mocking smile was back. "Nothing, I guess. Good night."

"Night, Echizen."

* * *

Yuuta'd expected to have time to help Echizen look through the stacks of paper his friends downstairs had put together--after all, he'd had nothing _but_ time for the past few weeks--but after the press conference, every lesser monster and petty supervillain crawled out from beneath their rocks to cause havoc. "What the hell _is_ all this?" he complained to Taka-san after the fifth straight mess that they'd had to clean up--no one had ever told him that being a superhero was hard work, on top of everything else.

"It's you," Taka-san said, with a shrug. "You're new. Everyone's hoping to get you."

"Get me?" Yuuta asked.

"Kill you," Kaidoh-san grunted. "They're testing us. If they manage to kill you, they get prestige with their scummy little cronies and it's obvious that Seishun isn't as powerful without Tensai."

"You're joking, right?" Yuuta asked them, but they just shrugged.

"They were joking, right?" he asked Echizen later, while he sifted through the paperwork that itemized Aniki's movements in the days just before he disappeared.

"No," Echizen said, absently. "Same thing happened when I came in. Didn't really stop till I kicked whatsisname's ass. That guy from Rikkai. Big quiet one."

Yuuta stared at him, appalled. "You mean I have to fight and beat someone like the _Emperor_ before anyone takes me seriously?"

"Less talking, more working, please," Echizen said.

"When we find Aniki I am retiring and never looking back," Yuuta muttered. "Mark my words."

Echizen laughed like he didn't believe him.

Tezuka-taichou didn't seem quite as blasé about the sudden uptick of activity, and when Yuuta saw him--which was less often these days, now that one small team or another was out patrolling at all times--looked tense around the eyes. "What's he so worried about?" he asked Oishi-san when they both happened to be in the canteen.

Oishi-san shrugged, noncommittal. "Could be anything." Yuuta doubted that, very much, so he waited, until Oishi-san stopped fiddling with his chopsticks and added, "He's worried there's someone out there behind all of the little fish. A big fish. Or a shark."

"Oh, _great_," Yuuta said. "That's just what I want to hear."

"It's probably nothing," Oishi-san hastened to assure him. "You know how Tezuka gets."

He relayed it to Echizen anyway, and watched Echizen frown. "That's... that's interesting," he said. "I don't know why I didn't think of that myself." He snorted. "I just thought he was worried about that stick up his ass."

"That's probably because you go out of your way to avoid him," Yuuta said, adding "Big shark?" to his list of Possible Reasons Aniki Is Missing. He looked up just in time to see the thunderous expression on Echizen's face. "You do. Are the two of you only a thing when Aniki's around?"

"That's not any of your business," Echizen snapped.

"Take it that's a yes," Yuuta murmured. "We'd better find Aniki fast, just so you two can stop snapping at each other every time you meet."

"Have I ever told you that you talk too damn much?" Echizen growled, and buried himself in his notes.

"Yeah, whatever." Yuuta bent back over his work, and added, after a moment, "I'm just glad I don't have to be the one to run this place. I'd kill you all at the first staff meeting." Although that was probably being too generous.

"Not if we killed you first." Echizen flipped one folder closed and added to a stack. "He's never had much problem doing his job." The line of his mouth was set.

"Yeah, and that's why I'd suck at it. Can you imagine having to be that damn responsible all the time?" Yuuta snorted. "I'd lose my fucking mind."

"Who ever said you had a mind to lose in the first place?" Echizen retorted. "And seriously, you're wasting time."

"Right, right," Yuuta said, and figured that was as much pushing as he ought to do in a day. Echizen was frowning at his paperwork like there was something bugging him, anyway, so maybe it was a start.

Later that week, when he saw Echizen and Tezuka-taichou sitting together, eating lunch and not saying a word to each other, he was careful not to smile--at least not until he heard Oishi-san mutter, not-quite-under-his-breath, "It's about damn _time_."

* * *

When progress finally happened, it happened all at once. Oishi-san, Kikumaru-san, and Momo-san were out on patrol, and Yuuta and Echizen had just finished up a practice session when sirens started going off. "What the shit?" he demanded, when Echizen dropped his towel and started running for the door. Yuuta chased after him. "Echizen, what the hell?"

"It's a big one," Echizen said. "Or someone's in trouble. Or _both_."

"Crap," Yuuta swore, and followed him through the twisting hallways, up a flight of stairs, and another, where they fell in with Inui-san--all the way up to the roof, where Tezuka-taichou already had the jet warming up.

"What is it?" Echizen asked, sliding into the copilot's seat.

"Oishi tagged his distress beacon." Tezuka-taichou's fingers flew over the switches, and the moment Kaidoh-san and Taka-san sprinted up the stairs, he pulled back on the throttle and they lifted off as the two of them belted themselves in. "I haven't been able to raise any of them since."

"Shit," Echizen said. "Do we have--"

"Nothing," Tezuka-taichou said. "Inui?"

Inui-san was balancing a laptop on his knees, typing furiously. "On it," he said.

Yuuta sat in his seat, fidgeting, not sure what--if anything--he ought to be doing. Taka-san and Kaidoh-san were doing the same, so he guessed there wasn't anything he was supposed to do but wait for them to get there, and try not to throw up from air sickness or nerves.

"Whatever it is, it's big and nasty," Inui-san said. He tapped a few more keys. "Tough, too."

"That's the best kind," Taka-san said, keyed up in the way he only ever got when he was about to fight. He was rubbing his hands together. "Sounds like a good time."

Yuuta scooted a little further away from him.

"Did I mention it was big?" Inui-san asked.

"You don't really need to," Echizen said, sounding resigned. "Look."

Yuuta craned his head around the seat in front of him to get a look, and nearly choked at the sheer size of the--well, it looked like it was part lizard and part rock and all pissed-off. "What in the--"

"That idiot Momoshiro ought to be able to handle a Godzilla rip-off in his sleep," Kaidoh said, frowning.

"I don't like this," Tezuka-taichou said, right before something hit the jet.

They lost altitude fast and hard enough that Yuuta's stomach was in his throat and there wasn't enough time to be either terrified or sick. Inui-san swore as his laptop slid out of his grip and smashed against the deck while Tezuka-taichou fought with the controls, leveling them off again. Someone shouted a warning to brace for impact, just before they touched down, bouncing and skidding to a halt.

Echizen was the first to speak, voice raspy over the moaning metal of the jet's frame and the dying sound that the engine was making. "Any landing you can walk away from."

"_Can_ we all walk?" Inui-san asked, and there was a scuffling of seatbelts as everyone checked themselves and each other over.

"What the hell hit us?" Yuuta demanded.

"I don't know," Tezuka-taichou said. "Inui?"

Inui-san was looking at the ruins of his laptop. "I had _something_." He gestured at the floor. "It's just a hypothesis, but I suspect the big nasty is just a decoy."

"You think?" Echizen snorted, and stretched an arm over his head. "It's a trap and we took the bait. Only way out now is through." He glanced at Tezuka-taichou. "Usual split?"

Tezuka-taichou took a moment to answer, like he was trying to decide, before he nodded. "Usual split."

Taka-san grinned and cracked his knuckles. "All right, let's go." He went to the door, and when it wouldn't open, pried it open, and jumped down to the ground. Inui-san and Kaidoh-san followed after.

Yuuta hesitated. "Um. So where do I--"

"With us," Echizen said, and grinned, sharp. "You're our honorary Shuusuke."

"Great," Yuuta said, under his breath, and fell in with them as they jumped down from the jet.

At first he thought they'd just landed in a quiet part of town, but then he realized that no, they'd landed--well, it looked like a commercial district, but it was deserted. The buildings were silent and dark, and he frowned. "What's up with--"

"Shh," Echizen murmured. "Low profile." He snorted. "Not that's going to stop the whatever-it-is from coming and finding us."

"What do we do then?" Yuuta asked, barely above a whisper.

Echizen's grin was positively feline. "Kick its ass till it runs home crying for mommy, and follow it there."

"And hope that 'mommy' isn't bigger than the three of us can handle," Tezuka-taichou added, tone dry.

"I used to think you'd have to be crazy to want to work a desk job," Yuuta muttered. "Suddenly I can see the appeal." Just to reassure himself, he reached out to the power grid of the city, wrapping a coil of it around himself--

And not a moment too soon; something that was huge and winged and vaguely reminiscent of a monkey came shrieking out of a top-floor window. Echizen lashed out with a gout of flame, and it plummeted to the street in flames--but there were more behind it.

"Behind me," Tezuka-taichou ordered, and lifted a bulwark from the street, asphalt and concrete buckling up and forming a wall for them to shelter behind.

"Ugly things, aren't they?" Echizen observed, wrapping a fireball around two that were flying too close together. "Mad scientist, you think?"

"Almost certainly," Tezuka-taichou said, gesturing; a spike of earth shot up, skewering another of the flying monkey whatevers. "On staff if nothing else." He frowned. "Looks like--"

"Yeah, it does," Echizen agreed. "But they're all in prison."

"Copycat, maybe," Tezuka said.

Yuuta wondered whether they knew how cute it made them look (albeit in a weird, fireball-throwing, laconic kind of way) when they dropped into that mode of finishing each other's sentences, but then another wave of the whatevers came screaming down at them, and he had other things to worry about.

One part of him felt vaguely guilty to be sucking on the city's grid this hard, lashing out at whatevers, knocking them out of the sky to fall in stinking piles. Surely there were people cursing the sudden blackouts just now, wondering what in the world was going on to make their lights flicker.

On the other hand, he couldn't care too much, because no matter how many whatevers they killed, more kept coming, until Yuuta was panting for breath, and even Tezuka-taichou had drops of sweat standing on his forehead.

And they still kept coming. "When's the part when they run home to mommy?" he asked, picking off another two, slower and more clumsily.

"I'd like to know that myself," Tezuka-taichou said, clipped.

"We're doing _our_ job," Echizen said. "They're the ones who aren't playing along."

The worst of it was that there wasn't the space to even think of an alternative solution, barely enough space to breathe. Yuuta propped himself against Tezuka-taichou's bulwark to save himself the energy of standing. "Guys," he said, "I'm running out of steam here."

He wasn't the only one, either, not if the pinched look of Tezuka-taichou's mouth and the way Echizen was laboring for breath were anything to go by. "Do the best you can," Tezuka-taichou told him. "That's all you can do."

This wouldn't be happening if Aniki were here, would it? There would have been a clever plan to get them out of this. Too bad he wasn't Aniki--just an Aniki stand-in. Yuuta zapped another of the whatevers, and another, and reached for the grid to zap a third, but fumbled the connection. "Shit," he said, as he felt his knees starting to give out.

The last thing he heard before he slipped under was Echizen saying, "Shit, we've lost Raitei--"

* * *

Every joint in his body hurt when he woke up, and he was tied up, hand and foot, and his cheek was pressed against something cold and metallic that hummed faintly.

To make matters worse, someone was gloating. At length. Something about how this was justice for the years he'd spent locked up, and who was laughing now, Seishun?

Yuuta forced his gummy eyelids open, but all he could see was shoes pacing back and forth--nice ones, leather-soled and polished to the point of gleaming, attached to someone wearing a nice suit, if the tailored details of his trousers were anything to go by--and beyond that, a few more sets of boots that looked like they were henchman-grade at the very least, and valued henchmen at that--they were all leather too, and nice-looking wool uniforms on top of that.

"Can't anyone shut the Monkey King up?" someone--Echizen--groaned, which brought Nice Shoes up short.

"You know," Nice Shoes--Monkey King? Yuuta liked that--purred, "I've had a _lot_ of time to think about all the ways I could make you pay for saddling me with that _delightful_ little nickname."

"I wouldn't advertise being such a slow thinker, if I were you," Echizen said. Sounded like he was coming from somewhere... somewhere higher than the Monkey King was. "Makes you look pretty bad."

Yuuta winced at the meaty sound that followed. Not so high that someone couldn't hit him.

"Stop provoking him," Tezuka-taichou said, sounding as tired as Yuuta felt. "Atobe, what do you want this time?"

Atobe--no, actually, Monkey King was much better--sighed, heavily. "Weren't you _listening_?"

"You tend to drone," Tezuka-taichou said. "Sorry," he added, not sounding sorry at all.

"It," the Monkey King said, slow and ominous, "is not at _all_ too late for me to open up the shark tank, you know."

"A shark tank, huh? That wouldn't be so bad--it almost has style. Have you been letting Mizuki tutor you?" Echizen again, sugar-sweet.

"Oh, it won't be for _you_," the Monkey King purred. "I had someone special in mind." He snapped his fingers. "Kabaji."

The biggest set of henchmen boots moved, shuffling past Yuuta's nose, giving him a bad moment, when he thought that special someone was going to be _him_. All bravado aside, being eaten by sharks wasn't really high on his list of the ways he wanted to die. But the giant boots kept moving past, and he sighed with relief. Something rattled behind him, like a padlock being unlocked, and then a door being pulled open, and--

Echizen made a sound, small and hurt, and Yuuta _knew_ who the special person was after all, especially when Tezuka-taichou whispered, "Shuusuke."

"Can you imagine how lucky I felt when the first thing I found after my escape from prison was him with his guard down?" And the Monkey King was back to gloating. "I don't think he ever realized I was there." He chuckled. "Would you like to watch me feed him to the sharks? I'm afraid I can't let him sober up, of course--having him awake for the experience would be perfect, but giving his proclivities, it's simply not feasible."

Yuuta bit down on his lower lip to keep from growling. The Monkey King was dead. _Dead._ He just had to figure out how to make it happen.

"What do you want?" Tezuka-taichou asked, raw and hoarse. "What is it, Atobe?"

"More than you can afford," the Monkey King purred. "I'm done with world conquest, you see. All I want _now_ is revenge."

The floor--the deck--whatever it was--hummed underneath his cheek. Every fiber of him was exhausted, but he could feel the energy running through the wires underneath him. All he had to do was--

All he had to do was force his exhausted resources past their limit to reach out for it, find enough strength to pull in enough of it to matter, and more strength to shape it enough that when he used it, he only hit his chosen targets. Oh, yeah, piece of cake. He'd have to get right on that.

The Monkey King snapped his fingers again. "Kabaji. The sharks."

Shit, he really _did_ have to get right on it. Yuuta sucked in a breath and closed his eyes--he'd been unconscious for a while; that had to count for resting, didn't it?--and tried to find the reserves that would let him do what he needed to do.

It was difficult, and the effort made him want to gasp for breath, but he couldn't risk drawing any attention to himself, not when one shot was all he was likely to get. He teased out strands of electricity, slowly--so slowly that Kabaji was wheeling a tank into the room by the time he felt like he had enough energy to do the job.

And meanwhile, Tezuka-taichou and Echizen were--talking. Begging. Apologizing for things that the Monkey King had taken offense at in years past. The Monkey King was drinking it in, swallowing it down, practically purring with gratification. "I've never heard you quite so eloquent, Echizen," he said. "Or so humble. It looks well on you."

"Thank you for saying so," Echizen said, every syllable throbbing with sincerity.

Enough was e-fucking-nough. "Hey, Monkey King," Yuuta rasped, and waited just until the man had figured out who was talking to him. "Go to hell."

It broke just about every rule there was to shoot first--although he was a prisoner, so maybe there were exceptions for the good guys, if they were trying to escape. It shattered them into pieces to shoot to kill. Yuuta figured that a better person probably would have cared, even with the Monkey King starting to sneer down at him. It was just too bad that he wasn't a particularly nice guy, especially not with his family on the line, he decided, and turned loose of the lightning that he was holding.

The results were short, and unpleasant, and likely to keep him vegetarian for the rest of his life--and he didn't even want to think about the nightmares he was going to have. What was worse was the fact that the exertion left him too limp to move even enough to look away, even after it was done and the screaming had stopped.

"Oh my God," someone said, voice weak. "Just what kind of barbarian did you get to replace me, Kunimitsu?"

Yuuta closed his eyes.

* * *

Fortunately, the cavalry--consisting of Taka-san in berserker mode, Kaidoh-san, and a somewhat worse-for-the-wear Inui-san--burst in just about then, and Aniki's question got lost in the ensuing confusion as they bustled around, undoing shackles and taking the last couple of surviving henchmen into custody and sussing out where Oishi-san's little team was being held. Yuuta let the fuss go on around him, too tired to move and glad to sit out of the way while Seishun crowded around Aniki to welcome him home.

Aniki wouldn't look in his direction, either, and when Ryuuzaki-sensei sent helicopters to get them home, contrived to be in the one that Yuuta wasn't, which meant that Yuuta rode back to Seishun's headquarters sandwiched between Momo-san and Kaidoh-san, both of whom were uncharacteristically quiet until they touched down on the helipad. "Look," Kaidoh-san said, abruptly, while Taka-san helped Yuuta out of his seat, "back there, with Atobe--did you do that?"

"Yeah," Yuuta said. "He was going to feed Aniki to the sharks. I had to stop him."

"There's stopping someone, and then there's stopping someone," Inui-san murmured.

Yuuta looked away from the four of them. "I know, okay? I wasn't really cut out for the superhero thing. I was just filling in for a little bit." He jerked his head in the direction of the other helicopter. "You've got Aniki back now to be the real thing."

"But you _killed_\--" Momo-san started.

Yuuta looked at him, too tired to even think about holding back. "Why do you think I even asked to join Seishun in the first place? It sure as hell wasn't for the tights. I wanted to--"

Taka-san stopped him before he could finish the thought, surprising him. "I wouldn't go around advertising that," he murmured. "Some people don't understand doing what's necessary."

"Especially when it's family," Kaidoh-san said. He jerked his head in the direction of the door. "Let's get out of this wind."

"...yeah," Momo-san said. "Let's go." He and Inui-san went ahead, faces still stiff with disapproval--well, screw 'em. It hadn't been their family on the line.

Yuuta did his best not to grimace and let Taka-san and Kaidoh-san help him inside and downstairs, wondering at them all the way, at least until the point where Oishi-san appeared at his elbow. "You're needed in the main conference room," he said, and the look on his face was enough to tell Yuuta what he was needed for.

"That didn't take long," he muttered.

"You want us to go with you?" Taka-san murmured.

"Naw, I'll be fine," Yuuta said, and didn't care whether he was lying. He shook their hands off his arm and limped his way down another level, through the atrium, and into the room where all of this had started and was probably about to end.

Tezuka-taichou was there, and Echizen, both of them damn near hovering over Aniki, who was thin and pale but seemed to be in good spirits--at least right up until Yuuta came in. Then he frowned. "Do we really need to do this now?" he murmured.

Yuuta pulled out the closest chair and collapsed into it. "Might as well get it over with," he said, and ran his fingers through his sweat-stiff hair. Everyone else was still in their masks, so he left his on too. "So what's it gonna be, taichou? Am I just kicked out, or is it going to be a trial?"

"It ought to be a trial," Ryuuzaki-sensei said, from somewhere behind him. She joined them at the table, frowning. "Do you have any idea what you did today?"

"He saved Shuusuke's life, that's what he did," Echizen said.

"He killed Atobe Keigo and five of his goons in cold blood," Ryuuzaki-sensei retorted.

"I wouldn't exactly call it _cold_ blood," Yuuta said, not looking at Aniki.

She waved that away as irrelevant. "The fact remains that they are _dead_, and when the media gets their hands on this, we are going to have a nightmare."

That was about what he'd expected she'd say. "Guess you'd better put me on trial, then," he said, and settled back in his seat, feeling strangely satisfied with himself. Maybe that was the exhaustion, though. It was hard to tell.

"Do you have any idea what your life span'll be like if you get locked up with a bunch of supervillains?" Echizen asked, mouth screwed up in a scowl. "It'll be measured in minutes, and that's if you're lucky."

"Yeah, I kinda figured." Yuuta shrugged, and winced as his muscles protested. "Look, Echizen, I know what I was signing up for. It's cool."

"That solves everything, doesn't it?" Aniki said, all calm and professional, and okay, that did sting a little; he would have hoped Aniki'd be at least a little curious about the guy who'd saved his life, or something. "If he admits what he's done, then I don't see what the problem is with having a trial."

That just seemed to piss Echizen off even more, for all that he was hovering over Aniki, but before he could say anything, Tezuka-taichou broke in. "There's not going to be a trial."

"There has to be something," Ryuuzaki-sensei said, still wearing her frown. "We can't just go around killing every supervillain who irritates us."

"I don't know, I kind of like the idea," Echizen said, with that fierce little smile of his. "It's efficient."

"Echizen!" Ryuuzaki-sensei sounded scandalized. Tezuka-taichou looked like he might have been trying not to smile, and when Yuuta snuck a glance at Aniki, he was frowning.

"Well, it _is_," Echizen muttered, sullenly.

"That's not how we operate, Ryouma," Tezuka-taichou murmured. "Even if the idea does have its merits."

"And why aren't you going to send him to trial, again?" Aniki asked. "I'd love to hear your reasoning, Kunimitsu."

"Because he's--"

"'Scuse me, taichou, can I say something?" Yuuta interrupted, before Tezuka-taichou could get into his explanation. Tezuka-taichou raised his eyebrows, but inclined his head. "Look, I signed on to fill in for--Tensai-san," he said, tripping just a little bit over Aniki's codename. "Now you've got him back, and you don't really need me around anymore. You probably ought to send me to trial, because I _did_ kill the Monkey King, and I don't regret it. He was out for blood, and I don't think that was going to change no matter how many times you threw him in prison. So if you have to do what's right, I'm not going to object."

"What, do you _want_ to be a martyr or something?" Echizen demanded, rolling his eyes. "We're not going to send you to trial, so shut up already."

"Well, he certainly can't stay on the team like this," Aniki said.

Ryuuzaki-sensei nodded. "It would be a PR nightmare," she agreed.

Yuuta sucked in a breath and closed his eyes; yeah, he'd figured it was going to come to this. Funny how he had thought getting kicked off would be easier to take than getting put on trial. "Fine," he said. "I'll try not to let the door hit me on my way out." He set his hands on the table and pushed himself up out of his chair, trying not to groan at the aches in his muscles. "Can I leave my stuff here for a couple of days, till I find a place to crash?"

Tezuka-taichou was frowning. "I don't think we need to go that far."

Yuuta snorted, and stripped off a glove. "No, I really think we do, taichou." He scrabbled his fingernails under the edge of the Seishun insignia on his shoulder, and ripped it off with some difficulty. "I think we all know I wasn't really cut out for this gig, don't we?" He dropped the patch on the table, and peeled off his mask. "I'll call when I find out where you can send my stuff. Will that work okay?"

Aniki made a strangled sound that might have been his name. Yuuta wasn't looking at him, just at Tezuka-tai--no, Tezuka-san, who nodded after a moment. "Take whatever time you need," he said, after a moment. "We'll hold onto it until you get settled again."

"Yeah, cool." Yuuta turned away, starting for the door.

"This is _bullshit_," Echizen announced, interrupting his dramatic moment and his momentum. "Sit your ass down, Yuuta, before you fall over."

That really wasn't fair, and Yuuta gave him a dirty look. "I'm not going to fall over."

Echizen rolled his eyes. "Oh, sure, and that's why your knees are shaking. Sit down and be reasonable."

"I'm being perfectly reasonable," Yuuta snapped, and compromised by leaning against a chair. "Or do I need to submit a letter of resignation to quit?" Aniki was staring at him, looking like he didn't know whether he wanted to be angry, appalled, or just plain stunned, and had settled on a mixture of all three.

"Well, there _is_ an exit interview," Ryuuzaki-sensei said, tone bone-dry. "You don't have to walk out right this instant, either. When I said that we couldn't keep you on as we had been, I was thinking more in terms of internal discipline rather than outright firing you."

"Then you should have said so," Yuuta snapped, and decided he'd take that seat after all. He crossed his arms and scowled at her. "What kind of internal discipline?"

"Counseling, certainly, and we'll have to dock your pay for a while, and you'll have to be supervised," she said, ticking the items of on her fingers. "We'll have to show that we've reformed you, of course. Perhaps Tensai can do that, while he gets back in condition."

Yuuta let the words wash over him, and he could see his future in them: Aniki holding his hand and watching his every move, just in case he should happen to snap and start killing bad guys all over again. "I... see," he said.

"I can do that," Aniki agreed, which was the first thing he'd said since Yuuta'd taken the mask off. "It'll be just like old times."

Oh fuck. Yuuta took a deep breath. "I... think I need to talk to Aniki alone for a moment. You mind?"

Ryuuzaki-sensei nodded. "Of course not. Gentlemen?" She withdrew, followed by Tezuka-san and Echizen, but not before they'd both managed to squeeze Aniki's shoulder (Tezuka-san) and ruffle a hand through his hair (Echizen).

Might as well get the easy stuff out of the way first. "So congratulations," Yuuta said, after a moment. "They're nice guys. Better than the ones you used to date."

Aniki looked surprised--yeah, he hadn't been expecting that--and then he flushed. "You, ah, found out about that?"

Yup, that was Aniki, all over. Good to know the Monkey King's drugs hadn't destroyed his basic personality. "They were basket cases about you, in their own dysfunctional ways. It was kind of hard to miss, Aniki." Yuuta sighed, and swiveled his chair around to look at him full-on. "If you ever feed me a line about how brothers don't keep secrets from each other again, I'm going to kick your ass so hard your waist'll be up near your ears."

Aniki had the grace to look embarrassed, at least. "I did mean to tell you," he said, and waved a hand. "About all of it."

Yuuta propped his chin up on a fist. "Yeah? When?"

"Oh... when you were thirty or forty, maybe. It's..." Aniki's voice trailed off, and it was quiet when he spoke again. "Well, you've seen. It's dangerous, sometimes. I didn't want you to be involved. I don't think I could stand it if I lost you, too."

Yuuta snorted. "Yeah? You ever think about how I might feel if the tables got turned?" Not likely; Aniki never thought about bad things happening to himself. Never had, as far as Yuuta could remember.

"Not hard enough," Aniki said. "I'm sorry, Yuuta."

Yuuta nodded. "Accepted." So much for the easy parts. He laced his fingers together and looked at Aniki. "So. Barbarian, huh?"

Aniki sucked in a breath. "You heard that."

"Yeah." He wasn't likely to forget it, either, no matter what Aniki said next. Well, he wasn't likely to forget anything that he'd done or seen or heard today. "It was pretty--bad, wasn't it?"

"I... yes. And no." Aniki hesitated, and Yuuta looked down again, not wanting to see the indecision on his brother's face. "It was... awful. But not as awful as I thought it was when you weren't--personally involved. If that makes sense." He paused again. "If our positions had been switched... I would have done something similar. So you're no more a barbarian than I am."

Yuuta looked up at him. "You mean that?" Because Aniki could be pretty lenient sometimes, and if he was making excuses just because it was Yuuta who'd done, not some other superhero--

"Of course I do," Aniki said.

"Then how come you were all for sending me to a trial before you knew it was me?" Yuuta asked.

Aniki looked trapped, for a split second. "I just told you," he said. "I didn't know it was--personal. And besides, it's not like you're going to do it again, so--"

"But I would," Yuuta told him. He took a breath. "I would do it again, and again, if I had to."

Aniki stopped, and several seconds ticked by before he responded. "Don't be silly, Yuuta. It was a fluke, and besides, I'll be around to keep it from happening again--"

"What if you're not?" Yuuta asked, quietly. "What if you end up in trouble again?" Aniki opened his mouth, but he kept going. "It happened once, so it can happen again. Do you really think I wouldn't move heaven and earth to help you? Or kill anyone who was hurting you?" And now to see how Aniki would react to that.

Aniki opened and closed his mouth a few times before he managed to say something. "_Yuuta._" Definitely appalled. "You can't just--there are _rules_\--"

Rules. Yeah. "Since when have I ever cared about rules, Aniki?" Yuuta asked him, and shrugged. "I told you. I'm not cut out for this job."

Aniki's face was white. "I raised you better than that," he said, finally.

"You raised me to put family first," Yuuta corrected him. When he smiled, it felt crooked on his face. "Why are you so surprised that it took?"

Aniki took a deep breath, and then another, and by the time he took the third, it looked like he'd managed to collect himself. "Be that as it may," he said, "we'll just have to make sure that a situation like that won't ever come up again."

Yuuta glanced at the Seishun patch lying on the conference table. "I think we already did that."

"Don't quit," Aniki said, after a moment. "It's not... it's not something you can walk away from. And besides, I want a chance to work with you."

"Then maybe you should have taken the block off my powers before we got into this mess," Yuuta said, and the way Aniki flinched at that confirmed what he'd suspected ever since he'd woken up in the infirmary the day Tezuka-san had brought him here.

Aniki smoothed his face out again, and ignored the jab. "What will you do, if you're not going to work here?"

Yuuta shrugged. "Dunno. I'll figure something out." He'd start with seeing whether Akazawa-san would let him have his old job back, and go on from there.

"Are you quitting because of me?" Aniki asked, all in a rush. "Because if you are, I can--surely we can do something. You don't have to--"

That was the problem; the more he thought about it, the more Yuuta was starting to think that maybe he did have to, if only so he could get his own head straightened out, and so maybe Aniki could do the same. He held up his hand and stopped Aniki. "Let it go, Aniki."

Aniki set his jaw. "Yuuta--"

"It'll be fine, Aniki. Let it go."

Aniki looked mutinous for a second, and that was kind of funny, because Yuuta thought that _he_ was supposed to be the stubborn one; then he shook his head. "What am I going to do with you?"

His chest felt tight, all of a sudden--how many times had he heard that, growing up? "Put up with me," Yuuta told him.

"...because I can't strangle you," Aniki finished. "You're sure?"

Yuuta nodded. "Yeah, I'm sure."

Aniki sighed. "I guess that's it, then."

"Yeah, it is." Yuuta pushed himself to his feet. "I'll let you know where I land, 'kay?" Aniki was quiet, so he shrugged and started for the door, only to stop short when Aniki said his name. "What?" He wouldn't put it past Aniki to try to talk him out of this one more time.

Aniki was staring at his hands. "I wish you wouldn't have done it that way, but... thank you." He looked up. "For, you know. Saving me from the shark tank."

Yuuta grinned a little at that, and it almost didn't hurt. "Hey. What else are little brothers for?" He shrugged. "Try to keep yourself out of trouble, huh? So I don't have to do it again?"

"You do the same," Aniki told him.

Yuuta snorted. "Yeah, well. I'll try. Later, Aniki."

Aniki looked like maybe he wanted to say something else, but in the end he just tipped his head into a little bow. "Later, Yuuta," he said.

Yuuta returned the nod, squared his shoulders, and did his best not to wobble on his way out the door.

* * *

**Epilogue**

"So you're really going, huh?"

Yuuta turned around and saw that Echizen was leaning against the side of the building, dressed in civilian clothes and scowling. "Yeah, I am."

Echizen screwed his face up even more. "It's stupid."

Yuuta waited, but he didn't clarify whether he thought the decision to go was stupid, or the rules that had forced it were. Upon reflection, Yuuta decided it didn't much matter. "Whatever, Echizen. Here to talk me out of it?"

Echizen rolled his eyes. "If Shuusuke couldn't talk you into staying, it's not like I'd be able to either." He pushed away from the side of the building, digging into a pocket. "Here. This is yours."

Yuuta looked down at the hand Echizen was thrusting at him, and shook his head. "I can't take that."

Echizen kept holding out his Seishun badge. "It's yours. You earned it fair and square."

"Gave it up fair and square, too," Yuuta reminded him. Echizen's hand didn't budge, though, and finally he gave in and took it. "What is this, a souvenir?"

Echizen shrugged. "It's yours. You figure it out." He stuffed his hands in his pockets and started back inside. "Try not to get yourself killed before you do."

Yuuta curled his fingers around the badge and began to smile for the first time that afternoon. "Yeah, yeah. Hey, take care of Aniki for me, will you?"

Echizen paused and grinned back at him. "What do you think they hired me for in the first place?" he asked.

"I always wondered about that." Yuuta tucked his badge in a pocket. "See you around, Echizen."

Echizen waved a hand at him and ducked inside. Yuuta watched the door swing shut behind him, hoisted the backpack on his shoulder a little higher, and set off down the sidewalk.

He'd figure out where he was going when he got there.

**end**


End file.
